In January GreenBiz posted a video about Microsoft’s use of Artificial Intelligence to advance sustainability around the world. Last July they launched a $50 million grant called AI for Earth, which has already started several projects including helping farmers produce more utilizing fewer resources. Josh Henretig, senior director of environmental sustainability at Microsoft, said "We hope that anyone will be able to take advantage of these tools.”

It’s a new year, which means it’s a new chance to expand your sustainability credentials. B Corp is an organization that Strategic Sustainability Consulting has been a proud member of for seven years.

Through our certification as a B Corp, SSC is part of a global community with more than 2,100 businesses from 50 countries and over 130 industries working together toward one goal — to redefine success in business.

Since February is B Corp Month we thought it would a great time to take a look back and remember why we became a certified member in 2011 and how we still value our membership years later.

If you don’t know what it means to be a certified B Corp here is a brief overview — we are a network or companies that are seeking to form a new sector in our economy, one that meet independent standards for social and environmental accountability. We aim to do so by addressing two major issues:

• corporate law that misaligns incentives between profits, employees, the community, and environmental well-being, and

• the lack of transparent standards differentiating good companies from good marketing, i.e. greenwashers.

You can’t just sign up to become a member, first SSC (and any other interested company) needs to pass the B Impact Rating System, demonstrate that our legal framework integrated our values throughout the company, and do the necessary paperwork. It may sound like an involved process, but the value of certification makes that all worthwhile. Think of it like this: the B Corp certification is what Fair Trade means to coffee. Being a member of B Corp is a symbol to our clients and colleagues that SSC is committed to “walking our talk.” We want to show the world that we are here to help organizations find the business value in being a responsible corporate citizen.

When we joined this community of like-minded businesses we weren’t just thinking ourselves, but also as a way to promote sustainable business practices to our clients. A number of years have passed since we got certified and SSC is still incredibly proud to be able to call ourselves B Corp members. Showing the world that your business is committed to being socially and environmentally accountable continues to be a top priority.

You can check out our profile on the website to see our impact report and if you are interested in becoming certified like SSC you can visit the Become a B Corporation page to learn more about the process.

Even if you went through and commissioned and then checked off an annual sustainability report, a carbon footprint, a life-cycle analysis, et cetera, there is no guarantee that your organization would even be close to executing a true sustainability strategy.

Sustainability strategy should be based on an organizational understanding of why you need to invest in assessing and reducing your environmental impact. Without understanding why, you risk wasting time and money on projects that don’t align with the overall business strategy and stakeholder needs.

After determining why sustainability is important to the organization, you should focus on materiality, or what are the most important or impactful steps the organization can make inside of a realistic timeframe or budget or deadline.

Finally, look to experts to develop a proven path forward that speaks to both the materiality and the underlying corporate strategy on this issue.

For example, if your company is a small manufacturing firm held accountable to demanding suppliers or upcoming environmental regulations, but you have no clear idea on your environmental impact, then your why may be “we need to know what we are facing so we can answer questions of our stakeholders with honesty and confidence.”

Next, is materiality – are suppliers or regulators more important? Can they be addressed through the same sustainability tool or report?

If you determine through a materiality assessment that your suppliers are the most important stakeholder group to address first, next, consider what information they are demanding, in what format, and by when. In the example case of manufacturing, this may be collecting LCA data for a supplier scorecard or more pulling together even more thorough data for a third-party environmental or human product declaration (EPD/HPD) report.

Essentially, sustainability strategy should be tailored as carefully as marketing strategy or pricing strategy.

Company leadership should clearly understand why the sustainability efforts are integral to the success of the company, how important they are to the stakeholders who drive that success to help prioritize efforts, and which strategic path forward to take to meet stakeholder needs best.